Shaun O'Hara: Rutgers will rise to Big Ten challenge

Shaun O’Hara, shown during 2009 with the Giants, believes Rutgers will rise to the challenge of the Big Ten.(Photo: GETTY IMAGES)

Story Highlights

Shaun O'Hara expects Rutgers to rise to the level of its competition in the Big Ten

The Hillsborough native said the Rutgers football family of alums is needed now more than ever

O'Hara, a former walk-on, endows a $100,000 scholarship to a walk-on football player at Rutgers

There are 17 former Scarlet Knights in the NFL now who were undrafted free agents – just like O'Hara

In retirement from the NFL, Shaun O'Hara works as a NFL Network analyst and runs a nonprofit foundation that bears his name and hosts an annual golf outing in New Jersey.

So it comes as no surprise when the former Rutgers football star joins the two sports together when asked about the reactions he has encountered to his alma mater joining the Big Ten, a long-awaited union that became official Tuesday.

"I've been confronted with a lot of guarded optimism," O'Hara told Gannett New Jersey. "Everybody is excited about the Big Ten, but they're not really sure how our team is going to fare. I tell them — just like in golf — you rise to the level of your competition.

"If you know you are playing great teams — just like if you know you are playing Tiger Woods — you are going to bring your 'A' game. It's going to raise your level of expectations. That's what I'm looking forward to most with the program."

Before he completed an 11-year NFL career, before he went to three Pro Bowls and earned a Super Bowl ring as the starting center for the Giants, and before he went undrafted out of Rutgers in 2000, O'Hara earned his spot on coach Terry Shea's team as a walk-on out of Hillsborough High School.

Now, O'Hara endows a $100,000 scholarship to a walk-on football player at Rutgers and remains in regular contact with head coach Kyle Flood. He spoke last week at a Rutgers Touchdown Club event.

"I know Kyle is looking forward to the challenge — it's going to be a challenge — but I think it is going to make Rutgers football better," O'Hara said. "It's not just about football. Going into the Big Ten is going to make all the sports better. But certainly football is what drives school spirit and we're going to see an exponentially stronger school spirit out of the student body."

Even as he remains involved with Rutgers, O'Hara didn't shy away from using Twitter to criticize the school officials who created a national controversy in early May by rescinding an earlier offer to paralyzed former football player Eric LeGrand to speak at graduation. LeGrand wound up speaking — and drawing a huge ovation — after Rutgers President Robert Barchi resolved what he called a "miscommunication."

"My allegiance is always going to be to Rutgers football," O'Hara said. "Sometimes you have to go through some ups and downs as a family. It's unconditional love at the end of the day. As long as everybody has that same mindset we'll look back on hiccups and say it made us stronger. I look at everything that has happened over the last one-and-a-half years and it's making the Rutgers football family stronger because we're rallying around each other because this is when they need us most."

O'Hara's standing in the family is an important one. He is like the uncle whose success at the next level is an inspiration for overlooked players from the next generation.

Since O'Hara, Rutgers has seen the likes of fellow retirees Gary Brackett and Darnell Stapleton go from undrafted to Super Bowl starters. There are 17 former Scarlet Knights in the NFL now who started out as undrafted free agents, including rookies Brandon Coleman, Marcus Thompson and Quron Pratt.

"Rutgers for so long flew under the radar and that's why there are so many guys that come out of Rutgers and don't get drafted," O'Hara said. "I think it goes to show how good of a program it is. You can have players that go under the radar and don't get drafted yet have such fruitful and lasting careers in the NFL. Rutgers does such a great job of preparing you for life and life's circumstances. It's not an isolated campus. You get a degree at Rutgers and you also get an education in life."

After four years with the Cleveland Browns, O'Hara signed with the Giants in 2004 and saw the homecoming as an opportunity — and his responsibility — to become visible at Rutgers. He struck up a relationship with former coach Greg Schiano that remains intact today.

"The football program has grown in leaps and bounds since I was there," O'Hara said, "but, the way that when I was there we were constantly the underdog, I think that mentality starts to creep in early in your career and that mentality is really what drives you even when you make it in the NFL Years 1 and 2. It's that mentality that I'm only here because I worked my butt off to get here. Not because anything was given to me. That work ethic, that mindset and that driven purpose is why you see guys come out of Rutgers and succeed."

Rutgers won eight games during O'Hara's four seasons (1996-99). It has matched or exceeded that victory total in a single season six times since then.

"The NFL, when you are in college, it always feels like it is so unattainable and it feels like it is just outside your reach," O'Hara said. "It's been great that I was able to come back to Rutgers and be around the guys."